Report Highlights Need for Enhanced Monitoring of Road Repairs in Northern Ireland

A recent report indicates a need for improved oversight of the quality of road repairs in Northern Ireland, particularly those conducted after utility works. The NI Audit Office stated that inadequate road repairs were “potentially a contributing factor” to the decline of the road network. In the last year, utility companies performed excavations on Northern Ireland’s roads 55,000 times. The Department for Infrastructure (DfI) estimates the total expense to address the existing maintenance backlog at approximately £3bn. Utility companies are required to excavate roads and pavements for various purposes, such as gas installations or home broadband upgrades. This activity took place 55,000 times in 2023/24, marking an increase from 53,000 openings in the preceding year and 54,000 the year prior. Current regulations stipulate that if road repairs following utility works are not executed correctly, the expenses for any necessary corrective measures fall upon the companies that performed the initial work, not taxpayers, provided the defects are identified within a two to three-year timeframe. The Audit Office report scrutinized the DfI’s effectiveness in overseeing the standard of roadworks and expresses criticism regarding the department’s existing method for assessing these defects. The report highlights that the department’s testing regime primarily involves numerous visual inspections, complemented by a limited volume of laboratory testing on samples from repairs. According to the report, although over 90% of repairs currently clear visual inspections, the proportion of repairs successfully passing laboratory tests is significantly lower. Auditors further discovered that the DfI fails to inspect the required volume of repairs, a situation the department attributes to staffing reductions. The report advises the department to evaluate the adequacy of the current warranty period in Northern Ireland. It references a review conducted in Scotland, which resulted in an extension of the warranty period to six years. Road expert Wesley Johnston commented that budgetary limitations have left the DfI with insufficient resources to inspect repairs. He stated on BBC Radio Ulster’s Evening Extra programme, “Utilities are opening up our roads roughly 150 times a day across Northern Ireland, which is a lot. In some cases those repairs aren’t up to scratch.” He added, “The problem really is that we’re not detecting inadequate repairs in time in order for them to be put right.” Johnston further explained, “You are saving a bit of money on staff time but it’s then creating a lot of costs in putting these things right when they do fail.” Concluding, he remarked, “We’re really just pushing the cost of it down into future generations.”